A sneak peek at a fintech founder's diary as she navigates business opportunities and regulatory curveballs.
A Tale of Two Cities begins with the now immortal lines: it was the best of times, it was the worst of times. If Charles Dickens wrote about the Indian fintech ecosystem today, we think it would be eerily similar, something like:
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of
times,
it was the age of unicorns, it was the age of
funding freeze,
it was the epoch of BNPL, it was the epoch of no FLDG,
it was the season of UPI, it was the season of zero MDR,
it was the spring of CBDCs, it was the winter of
cryptocurrencies,
we had everything before us, we had nothing before
us..."
2022 has been a tumultuous year for Indian fintech. We recently got
our hands on a fintech entrepreneur's diary describing its
highs and lows. Here's a glimpse at how she's been
navigating business opportunities and regulatory curveballs with
her trusted advisor, Cecil, by her side.
Dear Diary,
We're now among the top five most downloaded fintech apps
in India. Our marketing campaign was a hit, and it seems cashbacks
and influencer promotions did the trick. Nonetheless, it wasn't
smooth sailing. The tech team struggled to keep up with the surge
in users and the app crashed. Luckily, we were able to get it up
and running within the hour.
Dear Diary,
The pitch-deck is finally done. I was chasing my tail on the
monetisation model. After several hours of brainstorming with
Cecil, I added a few more slides on using payments data to
cross-sell credit products – our core monetisation strategy.
Fingers crossed.
Dear Diary,
We've been funded! Cecil and I jumped unabashedly on our
couch, I must admit. I posted on LinkedIn about the fund-raise
after running the post by Cecil. He thought it had the right mix of
humility and aplomb for a newly funded fintech start-up –
'humble brag' as the kids call it.
Dear Diary,
The investors asked us to tighten our KYC process. They've
been spooked by the Dhani identity thefts. I'm wary of adding
friction to the customer journey. But as Cecil reminded me,
it's a tradeoff between user convenience and security; and the
latter, in fintech, always wins. I also watched the Netflix series
on the Wirecard scandal. Scary
stuff.
Dear Diary,
We received an offer to partner with a crypto exchange. Cecil
and I are still bullish on crypto. Like Elon, Cecil's favorite
crypto is Doge. But our partner bank and
payment aggregator vetoed the proposal. Sigh.
Dear Diary,
I'm tired. I woke up with a terrible hangover after
Cecil's birthday party. And if that wasn't enough, our
partner bank called to discuss our co-branded card. They're
reluctant to share transaction data with us anymore because
theguidelines bar it. Our lawyers,
bless them, found a loophole.
Dear Diary,
RBI banned credit-loading PPIs. Cecil
and I had gone for a run. When we returned, I saw half a dozen
missed calls from our legal team. That's never a good sign. We
were going to launch a credit-loaded PPI. Not anymore.
Dear Diary,
The digital lending guidelines
dropped. Much has changed. It's another reminder that the
RBI holds the kill switch. I want to minimize disruption to our
existing customers that we've paid dearly to acquire.
Cecil's been a rock – a voice of reason and calm. This
too shall pass.
Dear Diary,
I'm in Bombay for this glitzy fintech event. The
who's-who of the fintech verse are here. There's a lot of
fist-bumping and chest-thumping on stage. But behind the scenes,
the mood is sombre. I find these events tedious. I'd much
rather spend my day tinkering with our app, discussing new ideas
with Cecil, or talking to users. Alas.
Dear Diary,
It's the last day to purge card data. We thought RBI
would relent. It didn't. Our payment aggregator said
they're prepared for tokenization. Cecil
tells me to trust them. And that's what I'll do because
that's all I can do.
Dear Diary,
I woke up today without Cecil slobbering all over me –
never a good sign. So I took him to the vet, which he hated, plus
it took all day. My start-up can wait, Cecil is my
priority.
Wishing Cecil a speedy recovery.
(This post has been authored by the fintech team at Ikigai Law. It was originally published in the October 2022 edition of our monthly fintech newsletter, FinTales.)
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